Winter Sports Roundup – Men’s Basketball

It was an average finish to an average year for the men’s basketball team.

The Elis (15-14, 7-7 Ivy) dropped their last two games to Penn (20-9, 12-2), 57-55, and Princeton (12-15, 10-4), 56-45, to close out their 2005-06 season. The Bulldogs finished fourth in the Ivy League, behind the Killer Ps and Cornell.

The Bulldogs nearly took down the Quakers, the eventual Ivy League champions, on March 3 in the penultimate contest of their season, but ended up falling by just two points. Penn had destroyed Yale, 74-52, in Philadelphia earlier in the season.

The Elis trailed by 10 points with just over seven minutes remaining on the clock, but outscored the Quakers, 8-0, in that time. Guard Nick Holmes ’08 sank two free throws with a minute left to play to pull Yale within two, but Penn’s Steve Danley responded with two of his own to widen the margin to four.

With just 1.9 seconds on the clock, forward Ross Morin ’09 hit a jumper and center Dominick Martin ’06 stole the inbounds pass to find guard Eric Flato ’08 at the top of the key. But Flato’s off-balance three-point attempt missed its mark, and the Bulldogs fell to a conference opponent on their home court for the first time all season.

The following night, the Elis struggled against the Tigers, scoring just 45 points in their season finale. The Bulldogs’ 16 turnovers led to 21 points for Princeton, led by Scott Greenman’s 13 points and five assists. Flato led Yale with 15 points, and forward Casey Hughes ’07 contributed 10 of his own to the Elis’ efforts.

After the season ended, Martin was awarded first-team All-Ivy honors and Flato received an honorable mention. Martin led the Elis in points (13.7 per game) and rebounds (7.1 per game). Flato was second on the team in scoring (11.3 ppg) and led the Bulldogs in three-point shooting (61 3s, 40.9 percent).